News

Patrick Troughton’s final Doctor Who story The War Games is reportedly next in line to be turned into a colour story.

Of the many treats for Doctor Who fans this month, the colourized re-edit of The Daleks is perhaps the most surprising. Terry Nation’s classic story has been edited from its original seven episodes down to a 75 minute colour feature, that’s going to be debuting on BBC iPlayer next week.

Furthermore, a physical media release for The Daleks In Colour has also been earmarked for next February, and you can pick up a copy of it here.

Now though, we learn that taking one black and white story and adding colour to it might just be the beginning. According to a fresh rumour, a second story is already being lined up.

According to The Mirror, so take it with a pinch of salt, The War Games is...

In terms of baseline quality, the Seventies is probably the most consistent Doctor Who has been until the 21st Century. There’s a classic story in nearly every season, and fondly-thought-of stories throughout. The long-list for this one was very long, the certainty of not including someone’s favourite even more certain than usual.

Producer Barry Letts and Script Editor Terrance Dicks took a show with the potential for cancellation and moved it from Quatermass homage to the cosiest of nightmare fuel: a family show on and off-screen with the reassuringly haughty Jon Pertwee ruffling hearts and minds at the head of a regular ensemble cast.

After five seasons the family was breaking up, and the show was revitalised by incoming Producer Philip Hinchcliffe and Script Editor Robert Holmes. Aiming at an older audience (Holmes in The Daily Express in 1977: ‘I wouldn’t let any child under ten see...

BBC Books has released a new edition of ‘Doctor Who and the Daleks’, David Whitaker’s adaptation of the first Dalek story that was originally published in 1964 (under the title ‘Doctor Who in an Exciting Adventure with the Daleks’) and the first Doctor Who novel ever published. The difference with this re-release (there was an earlier one in 2011) is it’s in hardback with illustrations by American artist Robert Hack (who started working on the Idw Comic range in 2008). You may have seen his art in the comics and TV title sequence of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.

Hack’s approach to the art, which is the really distinctive element here, is a successful fusion of the monochrome TV original, Whitaker’s prose, and the Peter Cushing colourful movie version from 1965. There are some of the same bold colours from Cushing’s movie but usually one colour dominates each painting,...

The title of Jodie Whittaker’s swan song as the Doctor has been announced: ‘The Power of the Doctor’. Presumably it will line events up for Russell T Davies’ 60th anniversary specials, ‘Remembrance of the Doctor’, ‘Resurrection of the Doctor’, ‘The Doctor’s Master Plan’ and, of course, ‘The Doctor Invasion of Earth’.

It is a story that will be many things – it will reintroduce Ace and Tegan (and potentially play merry Hell with canon as it does so), it will conclude the tenures of both the Thirteenth Doctor and Chris Chibnall, wrap up the Thasmin romance arc (our money’s on ‘It ends tragically’) and conclude whatever Dan’s arc is. Some are still holding onto an outlying chance that it might end the universe. People are going to have strong opinions about it, many ones that you can probably guess in advance.

However, before we dive back into...

I mean, it’s not like absolutely everything is terrible right now, but certainly a lot of things are and we could all do with a break. As a result, here’s a list of Doctor Who stories – one chosen per Doctor – that I put on for comfort. Sometimes you need something familiar and well-worn to unwind with.

This list is very much subjective, some of it is down to which Doctor Who videos I could afford when I was 10. These stories work for me and it’s unlikely they will work completely for someone else. Also worth mentioning is that this list is incomplete; these are not the only stories I watch for comfort, and indeed sometimes that’s not the reason I watch these stories.

First Doctor: ‘The Aztecs’

‘The Aztecs’ is a great example of Doctor Who that can be both familiar, endearing and brutal. In this...

Terrance Dicks, who was among the original writers of the "Doctor Who" series, is dead. He was aged 84.

Dicks had a long association with the long-running sci-fi show. He wrote episodes from the late 1960s till the early 1980s. He also served as its script editor from 1968 to 1974 and wrote over 60 "Doctor Who" novels.

Also Read:?Is Kristen Stewart all set to star in a Marvel movie?

The official fan site of the show confirmed the news on Twitter.

"Just received comms that legendary 'Doctor Who' writer, Terrance Dicks has died. Genuinely gutted. An incredibly talented man who we had the pleasure of interviewing over the years. He also regularly took part in QandAs on the Dwo Forums. He will be sorely missed!"

He also worked as a scriptwriter for shows including "The Avengers" and produced adaptions of literary classics such as "Oliver Twist", "David Copperfield" and "Vanity Fair".

Chris Chibnall,...

Andrew Blair Sep 3, 2019

Without Terrance Dicks' writing, Doctor Who could now well be a thing of the past. Andrew salutes his inestimable contribution...

This article originally ran on Den of Geek UK.

I met Terrance Dicks in Hamilton Library when I was eight. I was holding a copy of The Auton Invasion that I'd bought in a shop in Hereford and could not get the price sticker off. He said it was an early pressing of the first book he'd written for the Target Novelization range, then launched into an anecdote about it. It may not have been this story's first outing but damn it I was paying attention.

I mean, sure, he wrote Warmonger, but can any of us say they haven't on some level "written Warmonger"?

Certainly none of us can say we introduced thousands of children to literature, and not the "Ian McEwan pretends Science Fiction doesn't exist" sort of literature,...

Terrance Dicks, one of the original writers and long-time contributors to the BBC’s “Doctor Who” franchise, died at the age of 84.

The program’s official Twitter account tweeted out the news on Monday morning.

Born on May 10, 1935, in London, Dicks was first hired to work on “Doctor Who” as a script editor in 1968. He remained on the show until 1983.

Also Read: HBO Max Lands Streaming Rights to BBC's 'Doctor Who,' 'Top Gear,' 'The Office' and 'Luther'

Dicks worked as a script editor on more than 150 episodes of the long-running show, including penning classic serials including “The War Games” and “The Five Doctors.” He also wrote more than 60 “Doctor Who” novels for Target Books.

Breaking News… just received comms that legendary #DoctorWho writer, Terrance Dicks has died. Genuinely gutted. An incredibly talented man who we had the pleasure of interviewing over the years.

Terrance Dicks, one of the most prolific contributors to sci-fi series Doctor Who, has died at the age of 84.

Dicks had a long association with the BBC drama and wrote for the series between 1968, when he was hired as a script editor, through to 1983, when he wrote 20th anniversary special The Five Doctors.

He had a close working relationship with Doctor Who producer Barry Letts and also worked on Doctor Who stage plays as well as Doctor Who audio drama Comeback, which was one of the first spin-offs to involve companion Sarah Jane Smith in a significant capacity.

In addition to Doctor Who, he worked on soap opera Crossroads, created BBC sci-fi drama Moonbase 3 and wrote for Space: 1999 before overseeing the BBC strand that produced period adaptations of Oliver Twist and Vanity Fair between 1985 and 1988.

A slew of writers, including those in the Doctor Who universe, paid tribute to Dicks.

Andrew Blair Jul 18, 2019

The Doctor has been taken down a dark path several times in Who's history. Andrew explores why it's not a sustainable storytelling approach

This Doctor Who article comes from Den of Geek UK.

Iconic sci-fi author Iain M. Banks once said he didn’t want to write Doctor Who because you have to put all the toys back in the box afterward, as it’s written with a view to infinity, to the story never ending. Doctor Who is the answer to the question "What if a game of Consequences never stopped?" But if the show has proved anything over the years, it's that those consequences can never be that severe.

With different writers and creative teams, the show has dabbled in dark, violent stories, occasionally for a sustained period of time. Sometimes this is due to the aesthetic considerations of the creative team, sometimes things just...

Alex Westthorp Jun 17, 2019

Not every Time Lord on Doctor Who is as benevolent as our beloved Doctor, and The Master/Missy is only the start.

This article comes from Den of Geek UK.

Fifty years ago this Summer, the landmark Doctor Who story The War Games was transmitted on BBC One. Notable for being the last adventure to star Patrick Troughton as the Doctor, the serial also introduced us to the Doctor's alien race: The Time Lords. We learn the Doctor is a renegade, albeit a benign one. To celebrate this anniversary, Den Of Geek looks at some of the other renegade Time Lords the Doctor has encountered over the years.

The War Lord

Played by: Philip Madoc

Appearance: The War Games (1969)

The War Lord is a sinister-looking bespectacled man, seemingly in control of the various war zones.

read more: Doctor Who Season 12 to Feature Judoon

This role was Philip...

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

We’ve brought you a lot of features recently about one-time communist Malcolm Hulke, the classic Doctor Who scriptwriter whose career was the subject of a pamphlet, Doctor Who and the Communist, and an event, “An Afternoon with Terrance Dicks”. Well, this is the last portion. The podKast team takes a break this week so that you...

The post PodKast: Terrance Dicks Discusses Doctor Who Writer Malcolm Hulke (Part 2) appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Last week (Sunday 19th April 2015) I headed over to Manchester (following a scenic drive from South Yorkshire) for “Mac and Me: An Afternoon with Terrance Dicks”, in which the former Doctor Who script editor discussed his friend and colleague, Malcolm Hulke. You might have been there yourself, and if so will know that it was...

The post Recalling Last Sunday at the Fab Cafe with Terrance Dicks! appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

BBC

When Sydney Newman devised Doctor Who in 1963, there was no way he could have foreseen the global phenomenon his concept would become. He certainly couldn’t have predicted the passion for the series from its ever-expanding fanbase, or the ardent scrutiny with which they view their favourite programme.

Six years later Terrance Dicks and Malcolm Hulke created Gallifreyan lore when introducing the Time Lords, the Doctor’s own people. They might have known they were onto something big, but twenty years later a juggernaut of continuity had been established – one that wound up so cumbersome the home planet was supposedly dust by the time the show returned in 2005. Conventions and online forums buzzed with anger before it was revealed Rassilon and his kind actually survived.

All these events got a dissection of Silurian proportions via devotees of the Whoniverse over the years. Put simply, it isn’t difficult to offend a Whovian.

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Following on from the news that Terrance Dicks will be chatting with Michael Herbert at a Lass Productions event next month on the topic of Doctor Who writer Malcolm Hulke, Michael will discussing his recent pamphlet, Doctor Who and the Communist, at the States of Independence Bookfair in Leicester this Saturday 14 March at 2pm....

The post Michael Herbert Talks Mac Hulke This Saturday! appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Philip Bates is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Lass Productions, always a great friend of the good ship Kasterborous, is holding a very special event with Terrance Dicks celebrating the brilliant Malcolm Hulke. Held at Manchester’s Fab Cafe on 19th April, Dicks will discuss the work of his friend, Hulke, who is perhaps most famous for creating the Silurians and Sea Devils, but also...

The post Terrance Dicks Discusses Malcolm Hulke at ‘An Audience With…’ appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Philip Bates is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Malcolm Hulke is one of the most fascinating figures from behind-the-scenes of Doctor Who, and a new pamphlet examines his communist beliefs and their influence on his Who serials. Written by socialist historian, Michael Herbert, and published by Five Leaves Press, Doctor Who and the Communist costs just £4.00 and surveys Hulke’s contribution not only...

The post Learn About Malcolm Hulke: Doctor Who and the Communist appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

From the Macra to The Mysterious Planet, Andrew finds the gold in oft-unloved Doctor Who episodes from across the decades...

For the show's fiftieth anniversary, Doctor Who Magazine ran a new poll ranking the 241 stories up to and including The Time Of The Doctor. The Twin Dilemma came last again, having done so in 2009 survey, and though it does have many faults, it isn't completely bad. Colin Baker blazes his way haughtily through it, and the story noticeably lacks energy when he's off screen. Perhaps it might have been marginally better just to have had the Sixth Doctor and Peri go to a Little Chef so he could complain about the service.

In the lower half of the poll (compiled by people rating all the stories out of ten) are some pretty good stories, or at least ones that arguably don't deserve to be there. We've therefore compiled a list...

Alex pays a fond return revisit to 1960s classic TV series, The Avengers...

Stylish crime fighting, despicable evil masterminds, a bowler-hatted old Etonian gentleman spy and a series of beautiful leather cat-suited, kinky-booted, no-nonsense heroines. The Avengers had all this and more. What began as a monochrome tape series in January 1961 ran the whole of the Sixties, becoming a colourful slice of period hokum, full of flair, wit and sophistication, yet with its tongue firmly in its cheek.

Always the perfect gentleman, John Steed was played by Patrick Macnee. Originally billed second to the late Ian Hendry, Macnee was still playing Steed over 15 years later when he was teamed with the youthful duo of Joanna Lumley and Gareth Hunt for The New Avengers in 1976. In the 1998 film, the role of Steed was given to Ralph Fiennes and Uma Thurman played Emma Peel. I will say no more about the film.

With series 8 referencing 'heaven', Nathan traces Doctor Who's varied relationships with atheism and faith...

I was a massive Simpsons fan as a child. And when I say ‘massive’, I really do mean - huge. It’s still one of the more memorable moments prior to my wedding day: emptying out my childhood bedroom with my (now) wife, only for her to discover notebooks filled with minute observations about the show. Obscure number plates, birthdays of secondary characters, dates of key events and much more besides. Having already paid for the reception venue she couldn’t exactly retract her commitment to marry me, although my mind contemplated that possibility when she hyperventilated laughing at ‘little Nathan’, circa 1999.

My point is this: I wasn’t just a fan, I was an über-fan.

You might be asking, “what’s this got to do with Doctor Who?” - trust me, I’m getting there.

Jonathan Appleton is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Soon to be released by Miwk Publishing, Mac: The Life and Work of Malcolm Hulke will be the first biography of one of Doctor Who’s most influential writers. Written by John Williams, the book will examine a life that encompassed radical theatre, the Communist Party and pre-historic races that walked the planet long before man. Hulke

The post Mac: The Life and Work of Malcolm Hulke appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Philip Bates is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

It is 100 years since the outbreak of The Great War. Doctor Who is always a reflection of the times: just look at the Third Doctor era, especially the work of Malcolm Hulke. The concerns of the 1970s were perfectly encapsulated in stories like Doctor Who and the Silurians, Inferno, Frontier in Space and The

The post Commemorating The Great War Centenary Doctor Who Style appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Feature Andrew Blair 19 Nov 2013 - 06:39

In this week of Doctor Who celebration, Andrew salutes just a few of the individuals whose talent and hard work made the show what it is...

In the history of Doctor Who there are many names in the end credits that always seem to stand out. For some reason, I always look out for Alec Wheal in Eighties Who credits or, since 2005, the Script Editor. Over the years there have been hundreds of unsung contributors behind the scenes, and this article seeks to celebrate a handful of those who put in one helluva slog for our benefit.

Oh, and in researching this article I discovered that Dorka Nieradzik – who worked on Logopolis, Revelation of the Daleks and Silver Nemesis to name but a few – now appears to be Clive Owen's personal Hair and Make Up Artist.

It's not really relevant or anything, but...

Review Andrew Blair 28 Feb 2013 - 06:47

Looking for a short, sharp and fun Who adventure? Then you could do a lot worse than Mike Tucker's The Silurian Gift, Andrew writes...

Of the production team for the Sylvester McCoy era of Doctor Who, Mike Tucker wasn’t the one you’d expect to become the most prolific tie-in novelist. For a start, he was a visual effects assistant, who manfully operated the Kitling puppet in Survival by sticking his hand up its bum and lying as close to the ground as possible. You can make Six-Degrees of Kevin Bacon-style connections between effects personnel on Supercar through to the current series of Doctor Who through Tucker, unless of course you are Kevin Bacon, and don’t seem to realise how the whole Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon thing works.

The Silurian Gift is one of the Quick Reads series, clocking...

Doctor Who Dinosaurs on a Spaceship

B Van Heusen

As the name implied, tonight’s episode of Doctor Who was about some Dinosaurs on a Spaceship. The ship was controlled by the villainous Solomon who had hijacked it and seized control from the original owners – the Silurians.

Harry Potter baddie David Bradley was particularly menacing as Solomon while his two robot henchmen entertained us with some amusing banter. That being said, Chris Chibnall’s script was very English some I’m not sure the overseas fans will have appreciated the robots as much as the home crowd.

The involvement of Queen Nefertiti seemed unnecessary as did the inclusion of the game hunter Riddell (Rupert Graves). If I were cynical, I’d suggest that Riddell was only included so that Steven Moffat could give a role to one of his Sherlock regulars. Mark Williams on the other hand did a nice...

The turbulent decade of the 1980s – not much fun, eh? Thatcherism at the height of its powers. The emergence of the yuppies. Not to mention the likes of mannequin crooners like Duran Duran and Spandau Ballet dominating the charts like suited bankers. So no wonder Doctor Who wanted to go revisit the 1960s for inspiration.

Think I'm joking? Well think on this. We've had Hartnell-like temper flares from the main man Davison. We've had an all-new historical adventure. And now, in true Daleks Masterplan-style, a companion is about to bite the dust.

Yes, time's run out for Adric, everyone's favourite laughing stock. He's about to buy it in spectacular fashion at the end of Earthshock, one of the jewels in season nineteen's crown. The great thing about this at the time was that it came totally out of the blue. Normally, companions – of late – tend to leave of their own accord or get married.

Don’t you hate it when TV programmes have no opening credits? Sad case that I am, I caught a quick glimpse of Home And Away the other day, and noticed that they just launched into the “action” (well, if you can call Alf Stewart braying “Flamin’ galaaahhh!” action) without any opening titles or music. Logic apparently dictates that no titles leaves more time for the episode, but in reality, it makes the programme look cheap and nasty.

Plus, you don’t get to see who wrote the episode. Suppose they did this in Doctor Who? Imagine that you had to guess who wrote the episode from just following the story? Witty double-acts and gratuitous violence? That’s Robert Holmes. Moral issues and three-dimensional characters? Malcolm Hulke, then. The most obvious writer, though, undoubtedly has to be Terry Nation, whose scripts, while normally very good, contain an army of clichés...

Robert Holmes establishes his long-running genius for Doctor Who scripts in this first-class Pertwee story...

Back in my review on Colony In Space, I mentioned that writer Malcolm Hulke had found some way to travel forward in time. Well, now I’m convinced that there was a whole gaggle of writers who built their own Tardis, and armed with copious quantities of beer and kippers, travelled forward to the 21st century.

So while Hulke conducted research on the nitty-gritty of the British economy, Robert Sloman was assigned to have a chinwag with Sting about the environment, while Robert Holmes was assigned to do two things: One was to investigate the mundane policies of politicians, the other was to investigate that thorn in everyone’s TV side, reality TV. The end result? Carnival Of Monsters.

Carnival Of Monsters sticks out like a sore thumb in the Pertwee years. Most of the...

It’s now 40 years since the Silurians first made their appearance on Doctor Who. They recently commemorated the event by returning in Matt Smith’s debut season in the two-parter of The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood. Fans of that may wish to check out the original classic adventure, which was apparently named by Wotan from The War Machines.

Doctor Who And The Silurians really kicks the Third Doctor’s era into gear. Barry Letts, one of the show’s finest producers takes the helm. The stories are now shot in a mix of colour film and video rather than the all-film look of Spearhead From Space. The most notable debut though is the moral themes and issues, a common element of the Pertwee years. And with Malcolm Hulke at the typewriter, a host of moral debates are at work.

"The Silurians really shows that Doctor Who was starting to grow up,...